MercoPress. South Atlantic News Agency

Serious setback for President Lula in Sao Paulo mayor race

Conservative Kassab probed that Lula is not unbeatable

Brazil's ruling party and President Lula da Silva suffered a serious blow Sunday in the country's main city Sao Paulo where incumbent conservative mayor Gilberto Kassab comfortably won a second period defeating Marta Suplicy in the run off by almost twenty points.

Although Lula da Silva Workers Party is poised to gain power in many cities it lost the biggest prize and springboard for the next presidential election in 2010, the city of Sao Paulo. Kasseb's victory boosts the opposition's chances for the presidential election of 2010, when Lula da Silva is banned from running for a third mandate. However in Rio do Janeiro, Eduardo Paes, candidate for the Brazilian Democratic Movement, PMDB, and an important ally of President Lula da Silva was a few points ahead in the run off against an ex-guerrilla who once kidnapped a US ambassador. In Sao Paulo both candidates ran on similar platforms, but Suplicy, who served as Tourism minister in Lula da Silva's administration and is a former Sao Paulo mayor has been shunned because of personality and perceptions of arrogance, said David Fleischer, a political scientist at the University of Brasilia. Despite the global financial crisis that has cut Brazil's currency by half, none of the leading candidates backed off promises of improved roads, schools, and public transportation and health services. In Brazil, mayors are powerful vote gatherers in nationwide presidential and congressional elections. Kassab's victory means he almost certainly will back the candidacy of Sao Paulo State Governor Jose Serra, according to Fleischer. Lula da Silva beat Serra in Brazil's 2002 presidential race. "Serra will not only win his party's nomination, he stands a good chance of winning the 2010 elections," Fleischer said. In Rio de Janeiro, Fernando Gabeira, 67, a guerrilla-turned-congressman who in 1969 masterminded the abduction of the US ambassador to Rio, Charles Elbrick, to protest the military dictatorship, was in a technical tie when vote counting begun but momentum has since shifted to Eduardo Paes, 39. Gabeira is one of several former revolutionaries who are heavily involved in current politics. Lula da Silva's Social communication minister, Franklin Martins, also took part in Elbrick's kidnapping, and chief of staff Dilma Rousseff, a likely presidential contender in 2010, played a leading role in the armed resistance to the 1964-1985 dictatorship. President Lula da Silva's Workers' Party put in a strong showing in first-round voting October 5, winning elections in 137 cities including six of 27 state capitals.